This invention relates generally to telecommunications and more particularly to contacting subscribers of telecommunications services without revealing unpublished contact information.
Conventional landline telecommunications systems have been in existence for many years. Landline telecommunications involve the physical coupling through a conductive medium, such as a copper wire or optical fiber, between locations having transceiving equipment, such as telephones. Until fairly recently, most non-military communications have occurred via landlines. More recently, radio frequency-based communications have become commercially viable for the mass market. This form of analog or digital communication requires no physical conduction medium and so is termed “wireless.” Wireless communications free the user from the obligation of remaining proximate to the base equipment associated with landline communications. Instead, signal transmission occurs via satellites, wireless booster towers, and miniaturized transceivers that form part of the mobile wireless communication equipment.
In order for communications to occur between two or more locations having telecommunications equipment, it has been necessary for at least one of those locations to know the contact information (telephone number, e-mail address, etc.) for the other location or locations to be contacted. This need gave rise to the development of databases or directories of contact information for specific telecommunications system-equipped locations. One obvious example of such a database or directory is the telephone book, which provides a listing of contact telephone numbers for individuals and businesses within a specified region. Additionally, local and national directory assistance providers generate and supply contact information upon telephonic request. In operation, communicators of directory assistance service providers retrieve from a series of database choices the information of interest and convey it to the interested party.
Some estimates indicate that as many as ten billion calls are made for directory assistance for telephone numbers per annum throughout the world, indicating the importance of such contact information. Further, as use of the Internet expands, alternative databases of telephone numbers, facsimile numbers, e-mail addresses, web site addresses, and the like are made accessible by way of computer devices, such as personal computers. Necessarily, given the scope of interest in obtaining such contact information telephonically and by computer, the value of directory assistance providers has increased.
However, many subscribers of telecommunications service wish to prevent widespread dissemination of their contact information for various reasons such as privacy concerns, desire to prevent unsolicited calls, etc. Telecommunications service providers accommodate these subscribers by not publishing their contact information. Unpublished or “unlisted” contact information cannot be disseminated by directory assistance providers, meaning that directory assistance requestors of unpublished information are denied access to the contact information.
Accordingly, it would be desirable to have a system and method in which unpublished subscribers (i.e., subscribers for whom contact information is not published) can be contacted without revealing the unpublished contact information.